Michał Parniak awarded the ERC Starting Grant

03 09 2026

We are proud to anounce that Michał Parniak, head of the Quantum Optical Devices Laboratory, at the Centre of New Technologies (CeNT), University of Warsaw, has been awarded the prestigious ERC Starting Grant.

The QURA project of Michał aims to develop groundbreaking quantum sensors for measuring electromagnetic fields in the microwave, millimeter-wave, and terahertz ranges. The goal of the project is to overcome the physical limitations of classical electronics, such as thermal noise, amplifier limits, and the Chu geometric limit for small antennas. In the broader scheme, the project will contribute to the development of quantum electrometry and electric field metrology with th possible applications in next-generation high-bandwidth 6G and Beyond-5G wireless networks, space radiometry, including precise measurements of the cosmic microwave background and basic research, such as dark matter detection. The total budget of the projct (2 million EUR) includes, among other things, 400,000 EUR in dedicated funding for equipment (optical frequency comb and a mobile laser system).

Michał Parniak is the head of a research group at the Center for Optical Quantum Technologies, which is a part of the Centre of New Technologis of the University of Warsaw and professor at the Institute of Experimental Physics, Faculty of Physics, University of Warsaw. He earned his Ph.D. in physics (2019) and his habilitation degree (2023) with honors from the University of Warsaw. He gained international experience at, among other places, the QUANTOP center at the Niels Bohr Institute (University of Copenhagen) and at ICFO (Spain). He is the recipient of, among others, the Frank Wilczek Award (2022), the PTF Rubinowicz Award (2023), the KCIK Award (2020), the Pieńkowski Rector’s Award (2025), a START FNP fellowship with distinction, and the Ministry of Science and Higher Education’s Diamond Grant. He is the principal investigator of numerous NCN projects and the international RYDAR project awarded by the European Space Agency (ESA) and the author of over 45 publications in leading journals (including Nature Physics, Nature Photonics, Nature Communications, Physical Review Letters, and Optica) and a co-inventor on four granted patents.

This is the second ERC grant being carried out at the Centre of New Technologies. Earlier this year prof. Małgorzata Kot, the laureate of the ERC Consolidator Grant, moved to CeNT, where she will soon establish a new research group focused on archeology.

The Center for Optical Quantum Technologies is a part of the “Quantum Optical Technologies” (FENG.02.01-IP.05-0017/23) project, which is carried out within the Measure 2.1 International Research Agendas programme of the Foundation for Polish Science, co-financed by the European Union under the European Funds for Smart Economy 2021-2027 (FENG).

Fot. Mirosław Kaźmierczak / Uniwersytet Warszawski